closed Man City 1-0 Chelsea

[MoroccanBlue 5,383]

11 minutes ago, Jase said:

Not sure what's the FA Cup trophy requirement but didn't see it on his Wikipedia page. Either way, I meant him leading a team to win a cup competition. 

We shall see...

He has to be a part of the squad in the final to actually win the trophy, hence why Ballack didn't win one in 2007 or Rio during his entire United career.  Strange rule but Lukaku was hardly influential during that run. 

Edited January 15, 2022 by MoroccanBlue

[milka 3,393]

The last time when Chelsea have two wins in a row in PL was  from October ( 7:0 Norwich , 0:3 Newcastle ) OCTOBER .

[MoroccanBlue 5,383]

8 minutes ago, Pizy said:

We need to somehow identify some top class wide players who can score goals. Find the next players in the Mané/Salah/prime Pedro/Robben mould. And then build around Havertz up top. 

Fuck all these frail, dainty, soft wide players with mouse mentality like we have. We need aggressive, athletic guys who put unbelievable pressure on teams. That may be the only way we can haul City in and it’s what Liverpool have done these last few years.

These wide attacking players are hard to come by when you consider the PL proven remark is well and truly returning. 

[SomethingSomething 17]

Tuchel and this system works only when Chilwell and James are both fit and inform.

Simple as that. They are the most important players in the squad. 

Its super easy to see we struggle without them. Defence, linkup play and variety of threat upfront is halved without those two.

[Tomo 21,751]

38 minutes ago, Pizy said:

Lukaku is getting all the heat and he was indeed terrible overall but Ziyech and CP were shocking as well.

They were but the difference is they're getting held to account. They got hauled off and probably won't start again for a while bar the Plymouth game.

Lukaku was given the 90 and will likely be rewarded with another start on Tuesday.

[NikkiCFC 8,331]

1 hour ago, LAM09 said:

Finishing second (at worst) and closing the considerable cap of 19 points to City would be seen as an improvement by anyone. Not sure how this is even being questioned.

Last season Lampard was 12 points behind City when sacked. Tuchel 7. Overall 19. Now 13. So TT is doing worse than last season counting both him and Lampard. 

[Tomo 21,751]

5 minutes ago, MoroccanBlue said:

These wide attacking players are hard to come by when you consider the PL proven remark is well and truly returning. 

Whether we could attract him is another matter but Karim Adeyemi would be perfect for a LF role

[Blue Armour 4,448]

8 minutes ago, SomethingSomething said:

Tuchel and this system works only when Chilwell and James are both fit and inform.

Simple as that. They are the most important players in the squad. 

Its super easy to see we struggle without them. Defence, linkup play and variety of threat upfront is halved without those two.

Seems like instead we need to invest in quality second choice full-backs like City did, instead of additional strikers/attackers.

Else, we need to change up the formation and go to the back 4 like we did in recent games.

[Pizy 18,936]

16 minutes ago, MoroccanBlue said:

These wide attacking players are hard to come by when you consider the PL proven remark is well and truly returning. 

Chiesa would’ve of course been the ideal player but he is out long term now. That’s the profile of player we need to target.

Wide players who will get on the ball and sprint into attack with the intent to score or at last cause chaos. 

[DH1988 1,348]

Bang on points regarding full backs and let's not forget the injury/covid aspect. We've postponed no games either to memory.

[King Kante 1,643]

1 hour ago, Pizy said:

Lukaku is getting all the heat and he was indeed terrible overall but Ziyech and CP were shocking as well. Ziyech’s total inability to beat anyone with the ball was brutally exposed today. He’s slow as fuck. And his fabled passing that we saw at Ajax feels like a distant memory. He couldn’t complete simple passes. Pulisic is a once in 5-8 games player. He’s essentially a worse version of Willian.

I’d be perfectly happy to see us sell every forward player we currently have this summer except for Kai. Lukaku, Ziyech, Pulisic, and Werner can all go and I wouldn’t feel bad at all. Shouldn’t be difficult at all to find buyers for the latter 3. Lukaku is a massive anchor unless Inter or someone else take him on loan.

They got hauled off and even then they were giving much more than Lukaku who, yet again, was standing around just pointing at where he wanted the ball played and only moved if it went in the direction he wanted it to go. 

Lukaku is a absolute joke of a player and shouldn't be anywhere near our team. I mean not only does he do zero off the ball so it is like playing with 10 men (or even worse as his lack of pressing/movement also hinders what the AM's can do) he isn't even a elite finisher (if he was he would've scored that one he was put through for) or a elite link man (overplayed the ball to Ziyech or Puli in the first ten minutes.) 

Literally all he is good at is getting a couple of goals against the likes of Zenit, Villa, Burnley etc. I said before we brought him that he was a donkey and now having seen him play more I think he is an absolute gold played donkey. I mean seriously what are his redeeming features? Man City benched their best CB and he still barely won a header or could trap the ball. 

Absolutely farcical people wanted to sign him or still defending him.

[milka 3,393]

+ from our last and  the best game this season .

[MoroccanBlue 5,383]

41 minutes ago, Tomo said:

Whether we could attract him is another matter but Karim Adeyemi would be perfect for a LF role

Bundesliga tax is well and truly real. 

[Pizy 18,936]

14 minutes ago, King Kante said:

They got hauled off and even then they were giving much more than Lukaku who, yet again, was standing around just pointing at where he wanted the ball played and only moved if it went in the direction he wanted it to go. 

Lukaku is a absolute joke of a player and shouldn't be anywhere near our team. I mean not only does he do zero off the ball so it is like playing with 10 men (or even worse as his lack of pressing/movement also hinders what the AM's can do) he isn't even a elite finisher (if he was he would've scored that one he was put through for) or a elite link man (overplayed the ball to Ziyech or Puli in the first ten minutes.) 

Literally all he is good at is getting a couple of goals against the likes of Zenit, Villa, Burnley etc. I said before we brought him that he was a donkey and now having seen him play more I think he is an absolute gold played donkey. I mean seriously what are his redeeming features? Man City benched their best CB and he still barely won a header or could trap the ball. 

Absolutely farcical people wanted to sign him or still defending him.

I said before and just after we brought him in that it wouldn’t be the worst thing if Lukaku could bang them in against shit teams. I figured the rest of the attacking players would make up for him being subpar against the biggest teams. But none of our attacking players look any better than they did last season when they were mostly poor.

Lukaku should certainly be enough for us to finish top 4. But if we have any ambitions of ever finishing above City in the near future we won’t do it with him. But what do you do with him? Unless we are so desperate to move him on that we’ll take a massive loss nobody can afford his fee + wages.

He is basically the outfield version of Kepa. We’re stuck with him.

[MoroccanBlue 5,383]

10 minutes ago, Pizy said:

But if we have any ambitions of ever finishing above City in the near future we won’t do it with him.

That's the thing. If we want to finish above City we need to operate like them in the market. Identifying targets that meet that manager's profile vs buying for the sake of buying. 

You, me, my nan and my dog knew Lukaku didn't meet Tuchel's profile. This is primarily the reason why we have stagnated for years whereas City have endured sustainable success. 

[Laylabelle 9,536]

Least it was a crazy loss..but so frustrating. For them it was a kick about! We'd get the ball..and either go backwards or they end up with it. Least didn't finish with 0 shots on target but still..expected unfortunately. 

[LAM09 7,061]

1 hour ago, NikkiCFC said:

Last season Lampard was 12 points behind City when sacked. Tuchel 7. Overall 19. Now 13. So TT is doing worse than last season counting both him and Lampard. 

My response to the other poster was about us being in a better position had we not slipped up multiple times & gone from 6 points clear to this.

Our current situation in terms of league play isn't far off last season right now.

 

[milka 3,393]

Let's just accept we gave 100m to  big charity and send him back to Inter where he love to be .

Diego Costa is free agent anyway . 

[cosmicway 1,333]

City dominated alright.
But might have been a different story with the Lukaku chance.
You saw what happend after the goalkeeper saved it ?
The ball went to Ziyech in a shooting position. The City goalkeeper badly placed after his effort to save from Lukaku and Ziyech aims for the roof of the stadium.

[Fulham Broadway 17,330]

2 hours ago, MoroccanBlue said:

This is primarily the reason why we have stagnated for years

If you'd supported in the 70s and 80s might agree with you.

Since Abramovich its been unprecedented success - even if you're talking of the last decade -Premier League winners 3 times, Champions League Winners twice and current European Champions, FA Cup winners 3 times, UEFA League Winners twice, UEFA Super Cup Winners, League and League Cup Double, FA Cup and Champions League Double.

If thats 'stagnation' we'll have more please